Fugro Aberdeen looking for ROV personnel

[Anonymous]

Senior

I too have had a bumper last few years on an ever increasing day-rate but as I said, I wouldn’t get out of bed for Fugro’s rate 😛

Adios

[Ray Shields]

Ray I have done 8 jobs for Fugro Rovtech this year and each job was one Permanent Supervisory bloke and the rest of us were all contractors ,the permanent chaps were all longterm fugro Rovtech emplyees and very good men and they all said that Fugro had dumped all other staff to hire contractors as and when required and that was exactly what i saw and experienced , also many of the agency blokes were ex Fugro who only 1 or 2 years ago had been permanent on the very same ROVs we were engaged to work on .

The agencies i worked for said exactly the same story too.Mind you this was all rig based work not vessel based , so maybe on Fugro ships its different .

There have been no ROV redundancies at Fugro (Fugro Survey and then Fugro Rovtech when they bought Rovtech) since about I think its about 2001.

When Fugro bought Rovtech, some people did leave and work for other companies as well as Agency, and of course others have left since then, this may be the people you are talking about.

This year there were a lot of Agency people used for Drill Support work, but this was due to not enough staff people being available. The majority of staff at FR are on a contract that pays them a salary and a minimum number of offshore days whether they work them or not, they do not leave people at home getting paid when they don’t need to.

@ExcavatorDrivers . Assuming MacDonalds pay minimum wage of £5.93 an hour, a 12 hour shift would take in £71.16. A Trainee starting work offshore on basic salary and working 150 days in a year would earn £190 for a 12 hour shift. At PT1 (which is what Fugro are currently looking for), it is about £250.

So I believe you are incorrect.

[alan child]

Even if Kinloss shuts, wont the RAF personnel get moved to other sites? Its the contractors and locals who are stuffed 🙁

not all will move, many if not most will op to stay up north in scotland by choice or will get dropped by redundancy over the next couple of years. dont forget about Lossy as well they already getting posting notices down to norfolk, and many are opting not leave rather than move down south.

the only large RAF unit left in scotland will be leuchars with the new tiffy moving up just last week, but one unit cant provide employment for the many 1000’s of engineer based and settled in scotland

"so off to the rigs then"

is the topic of conversation in all sqaudron crew rooms this week i can tell ya

al404

[deepseacon]

Ray

Are you saying Fugro Pay 250 GBP PT1 assuming that is the grading for a Pilot Tech The next grade would be Senior Pilot Tech?.

You said there looking for experenced crew but they will pay 250 GBP?

I can not see many serious takers for that rate.

[James McLauchlan]

I have to agree that £250 does seem on the low side. Especially when it appears Fugro Aberdeen want experienced people for that rate.
North Sea Riggers almost pull that amount!

Interesting that they (Fugro Aberdeen) are advertising as the North Sea season draws to a close.. a point at which some freelance people may be wondering when their next job might come in and just might consider taking an iffy rate for the winter.

It comes as no surprise to me that whilst I’m inclined to agree with Ray about there having been no redundancies over the last 18 months, Fugro must have seen a fair amount of experienced ROV people leave (as suggested by another poster in this thread), probably through lack of decent rates and conditions, or better opportunities elsewhere.. which in effect amounts to the same thing.

[Ewan McKen]

With Salary in the UK comes benefits.

I have been told that to match £250 a day on Salary you have to make £312.50 Freelance.

Given the current doom and gloom in the UK, the Salary Comfort Factor may also be attractive to many.

I dont think they will struggle for applicants.

Regards,
I5

[marley]

Its amusing to follow some threads on here. I’m sure they will have piles of CVs to thumb thru. We (meaning ROV types) are making a rod to beat our own arse with. Dont ya think that the operators will view it like this,,,,,will they can work for xxxgbp in the winter they can do it in the summer.

Oh if we only had a union.

That right I said it ….a union..

[Ray Shields]

Ray

Are you saying Fugro Pay 250 GBP PT1 assuming that is the grading for a Pilot Tech The next grade would be Senior Pilot Tech?.

You said there looking for experenced crew but they will pay 250 GBP?

I can not see many serious takers for that rate.

My knowledge of the PTs rates is a couple of years old, but believe that now a PT1 (they have PT1 to PT4) is about £27k, plus £120 a day. So add £27k and 150*£120 = £45k divided by 150 days of wortk, so thats actually £300 a day it works out as.

Plus sick pay, plus pension (after the forst 12 months I think), and as mentioned to get the equivalent as Agency you need a significantly higher rate, you also know you will get paid salary and a guaranteed no. of days whether you work them or not.

I’m not saying its a good thing or a bad thing, just giving some information.

Also, next up from PT1 you can either branch off to Supervisor 2 then Supervisor 1, or you can become Sub Eng 3, then 2 then 1. All silly in my opinion as I have always believed you should have to be a Sub Eng before you can be a Supervisor.

[Ray Shields]

It comes as no surprise to me that whilst I’m inclined to agree with Ray about there having been no redundancies over the last 18 months, Fugro must have seen a fair amount of experienced ROV people leave (as suggested by another poster in this thread), probably through lack of decent rates and conditions, or better opportunities elsewhere.. which in effect amounts to the same thing.

Alas as Fugro have become a bigger company I am now no longer in a position to know exactly who is where and who has come and gone. I know a few people have left, some people have been told to go 🙂 But believe the number is in the region of no more than a dozen, out of I think almost 250 now.

There was a freeze for the last year or so on recruitment, but this season showed that there was a need for more people given the number of Agency staff that were used, hence I assume now that work commitments and future plans have been made, they can now take some people on to fill gaps and slots that this year were used by Agency.

Not exactly a mass exodus. Its a shame it is not trainees they are taking on, but I see what we are missing is more people in the middle, Sub Engineer grade, rather than more PTs.

[alan child]

"Its a shame it is not trainees they are taking on"

i couldnt agree more my friend with your statement

still hope yet

Al404

[piedpiper]

I have to agree that £250 does seem on the low side. Especially when it appears Fugro Aberdeen want experienced people for that rate.
North Sea Riggers almost pull that amount!

James, looking at the thread you started with the new rates for North Sea peronnel see :- http://www.rovworld.com/ftopict-4137.html a north sea rigger is now on £312 a day. Not knocking the riggers, but at best you could only call them semi skilled ! They certainly do not do a 4 year apprenticeship to get that sort of day rate. Just goes to show how we were badly let down by the uni0n.

So Fugros rates, however you dress them up are shite ! I guess this is maybe why they are advertising in the winter… to get the desperate out there who would shamefully sell themselves for less than the dayrate of an offshore labourer.

piedpiper

[piedpiper]

there will be alot more interest now that RAF scotland just got the can

lots of very expert people, with loads of mechanical and electrical knowledge just about to get their marching orders

would be good pickings for all you recruitment chaps out there?

Al404

Great, just what we want, another load of wannabees to drive down the dayrate…

piedpiper

[liddelljohn]

working for Fugro as a PT this year I was getting £360 from the agency on all the jobs .

[piedpiper]

working for Fugro as a PT this year I was getting £360 from the agency on all the jobs .

But that is the point, you weren’t working for Fugro, you were working for the agency !

piedpiper

[luckyjim37]

You cannot start to realistically compare the agency rate to the staff rate in direct terms.

The staff member costs the company a lot in other ways such as pensions, holiday pay, sick pay, PPE and any other benefits the company contributes towards.

An agency worker is just a flat fee on a day rate basis. A lot of agency guys will be quoting a higher day rate (especially the LTD company guys) but if they are not paye with the agency so if you adjust it taking into account employers NI and corporate tax on that figure you start to notice it is not that much better. There are other perks to being a LTD company agency guy when it comes to personal tax but that depends on how you run your company.

As for advertising in the winter. Why not? A lot of good guys sat at home concerned about how quite it may be over the next six months. Seems like a good time to snap them up from my point of view.
I also seem to recall about 9 years ago when starting with Fugro that it was this time of year that they started the selection process for trainees at the time. It makes sense when the industry is a litle quieter so ops managers/ROV managers etc can spend some time assisting the HR department with employing the right people. Rather than recruiting mid season when you would be to busy to spend a day interviewing and reading C.V’S leading the the HR department conducting the entire recruitment process and employing the wrong people.

Lets face it even quaulified guys can be unsuitable if they have the wrong temprament.

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